Consumers in the United States, Brazil and Canada rank identity theft and counterfeiting as top concerns of using credit cards, and a majority believe fraudsters are a step ahead of the financial services companies, according to a recent Visa survey. Changing those perceptions by better protecting financial data was a focus of Visa’s Global Security Summit, which attracted more than 500 business, government, academic and law enforcement officials to Washington last week.

Visa’s Chief Enterprise Risk Officer Ellen Richey said the industry must increase investments in smarter credit cards and authentication methods while better managing current intelligence. Still, she said, “Visa’s global fraud rate recently hit a historic low — at just over 5 cents for every $100 transacted, down more than two-thirds from the levels of 20 years ago. And more than 99 percent of large merchants have confirmed they do not store sensitive cardholder data.”

Former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, a keynote speaker, said there are two ways to build a trustworthy network.

“One is risk management,” he said. “There is not going to be anybody who comes up with a magic solution that guarantees that there’s not going to be fraud, other kinds of theft or actual attacks on our cybersystems and our payment networks. And if we search for that illusory guarantee, we’re either going to wind up overinvesting, or we’re going to wind up raising expectations and disappointing them in a very damaging way.”

“The second is to recognize there isn’t one solution,” he added. “In fact, there are a series of solutions, and not all fit every kind of problem. At the high end, … we worry about very sophisticated attacks on our national critical infrastructure. … Much of the problem can be dealt with looking at, frankly, less sophisticated strategies, and we ought not to wait until we solve the hardest problem to take steps to solve the less hard problems.”

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